194 posts categorized "Investigations"

November 24, 2009

Al Sanchez, Mayor Richard Daley’s former streets and sanitation commissioner, alleges in a new court filing that a Chicago police sergeant may have tried to obstruct Sanchez’s efforts to overturn his federal conviction on charges he rigged City Hall hiring.

Sanchez has asked the judge in his case to take the unusual step of reopening a hearing that had previously explored the conduct of law enforcement officials.

November 22, 2009

A politically connected zoning investigator has returned to work at City Hall barely a week after he admitted to accepting bribes of cash and gifts to repeatedly overlook zoning violations.

William Wellhausen — who pleaded guilty Nov. 3 and was brought back to the job the following Monday — said he’s clueless why that happened.

“I have no idea. You’ll have to ask the city,” Wellhausen said before hanging up the telephone at the city’s Landmarks Commission, where he is doing clerical work.

Court records show that Wellhausen took bribes ranging from $100 to $8,000, including a $200 Bloomingdales gift card, in exchange for favorable zoning decisions.

Wellhausen is one of 27 individuals swept up so far in an ongoing federal bribery investigation known as Operation Crooked Code. He and one of his co-defendants, plumbing inspector Mario Olivella, both recently returned to work.

Olivella has not been convicted of any crimes and is awaiting trial in December.

City officials said they earlier tried to fire the two men but their hands are tied because of the ongoing criminal investigation.

Jenny Hoyle, a spokeswoman for the Law Department, said Wellhausen and Olivella were receiving salaries while waiting for their criminal cases to conclude. “They were sitting at home getting paid. They have been brought back to do nonsensitive work because they are getting paid anyway,” Hoyle said. “They are not doing any inspections.”

Olivella makes almost $90,000 a year, and Wellhausen makes about $78,000 a year.

Hoyle said she did not know what prompted the city to bring them back now, since they had not been working since shortly after their arrests in May 2008.

Olivella could not be reached for comment. His lawyer, Dan Herbert, said he did not know why the city decided to bring him back to the job now. “It’s the city of Chicago, and they work in strange ways,” Herbert said. “My guess is they don’t want to be paying for people sitting at home.”

The U.S. attorney’s office declined to comment about the change in the men’s job status.Wellhausen, 52, has deep roots with former Ald. William J.P. Banks’ 36th Ward Democratic Organization. The 36th Ward pushed for Wellhausen to get a coveted city job as early as 1990, according to a “clout list” entered into evidence at the 2006 trial of Mayor Richard Daley’s former patronage chief.

The mayor’s office kept the list of campaign workers who were seeking city jobs in exchange for their loyalty to Daley’s political organization.

Federal authorities, in a joint investigation with the city’s inspector general, charged Wellhausen and Olivella as part of their probe into systemic corruption in the city’s zoning and building departments.

The city fired both men in July 2008 but they appealed to the Human Resources Board, Hoyle said.City Hall could not move forward with the disciplinary hearing because the bulk of the evidence the city needed to make its case is in the possession of federal authorities, who are continuing their work, Hoyle said.

Since the city did not proceed with the hearing within the allotted time under the municipal code, the city is required to pay the two men until the Human Resources Board ultimately makes its decision. Hoyle said city lawyers are reviewing Wellhausen’s guilty plea to determine how quickly to take the case to the board for a decision.

Wellhausen’s sentencing has been delayed until his cooperation with law enforcement is no longer needed. Prosecutors have agreed to recommend that Wellhausen be sentenced to 15 months in prison and pay a fine of more than $33,000.

October 27, 2009

City Hall's top environmental official should be suspended for a day and one of her deputies fired in the wake of an investigation into alleged hiring abuses, the inspector general's office found.

The office accused an unidentified deputy commissioner of giving false and misleading statements to investigators looking into hiring complaints and should lose his job.

Suzanne Malec-McKenna, Mayor Richard Daley's environmental commissioner since 2007, should receive the brief suspension for her alleged failure to properly supervise her deputy, the inspector general suggested.

September 23, 2009

Ald. Brian Doherty (41st) was once the political godfather for the latest city employee arrested in the ongoing probe of corruption in City Hall's oversight of the construction industry.

Dominick Owens, the Chicago zoning inspector charged Tuesday with taking more than $20,000 in bribes, appeared on the "clout list" of politically connected job seekers that became public during the 2006 federal corruption trial of Mayor Richard Daley's patronage chief, Robert Sorich.

September 22, 2009

Lawyers for indicted developer Calvin Boender have served subpoenas on at least six Chicago aldermen in an effort to clear their client of fraud charges, City Hall officials confirmed Tuesday.

Jenny Hoyle, spokeswoman for the Law Department, said the city had received copies of subpoenas from Boender’s lawyers seeking “trial testimony and no documents” from the aldermen. Hoyle declined to provide the subpoenas, issued by defense lawyer Joe Roddy, or disclose the names of the elected officials receiving them.

Boender, who has developed projects in wards around the city, has pleaded not guilty. Sources said he may be asking aldermen to testify about their dealings with him.

September 16, 2009

The U.S. House ethics committee announced today it is holding off on a probe into whether Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.) sought to win a Senate seat by offering to raise money for ex-Gov. Rod Blagojevich, citing the ongoing federal investigation.

The ethics panel also disclosed for the first time that congressional ethics investigators alleged Jackson used taxpayer-funded staff members in his Washington and Chicago offices to mount a “public campaign” to get the Senate appointment from Blagojevich late last year. The Office of Congressional Ethics’ board approved a report this summer saying that “in doing so” Jackson “may have violated federal law and House rules concerning the proper use” of his office funds.

The panel indicated it typically puts its probes on hold when asked to by law enforcement to avoid interfering with prosecutors, and it disclosed a Justice Department letter requesting the committee hold off until after Blagojevich's trial. That is scheduled for next year.

August 17, 2009

Illinois saves almost $2 million by redrawing lease with Blagojevich contributor

Oversight board orders $2 million in cuts from the cost of a five-year lease deal in Harvey for a Blagojevich donor

By Ray Long

Tribune reporter

An oversight board forced the state to cut $2 million from the cost of a five-year sweetheart lease deal in suburban Harvey for a generous political contributor to former Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

The Blagojevich administration's plan to grant a lucrative lease extension on a Department of Children and Family Services office was revealed by the Tribune last year.

The proposal surfaced at the little-known Procurement Policy Board, which questioned the original lease proposal early last year, then halted it. The deal drew additional scrutiny in the special House hearings in January that launched the ex-governor's impeachment.

July 28, 2009

Mayor Richard Daley today found a bright spot in the ongoing internal investigation of how students get into the city's highly competitive magnet schools--he suggested it shows Chicago public education is on the rise.

"Remember, we had most people never going to public schools," Daley told reporters at an unrelated City Hall news conference this morning. "I mean, this is unbelievable. Most people fled the city."

July 23, 2009

New investigation into tax appeals

Records sought involving firms in lawmaker's district

By John Chase

Tribune reporter

Cook County prosecutors have demanded records from the county tax appeal board amid questions about property-tax breaks awarded to businessmen who are political supporters of a state lawmaker, the Tribune has learned.

The grand jury subpoenas to the Cook County Board of Review seek records on tax appeal cases that are already the subject of an internal board investigation involving state Rep. Paul Froehlich (D- Schaumburg) and a political associate who used to work for tax board Commissioner Joseph Berrios.

One of three elected board members, Berrios is also chairman of the Cook County Democratic Party and a Springfield lobbyist with close ties to House Speaker Michael Madigan, the state Democratic Party chairman.

July 08, 2009

An audit released today says the state likely will “recover very little” of a $1 million grant then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s administration wrongly gave to a politically connected private school that was damaged in a 2006 church fire.

Illinois Auditor General William Holland's report found that taxpayers might only get back $119,000 due to mounting expenses and numerous liens filed against Loop Lab School.

All 50 aldermen on the Chicago City Council had to file paperwork earlier this year detailing their outside income and gifts. The Tribune took that ethics paperwork and posted the information here for you to see. You can search by ward number or alderman's last name.

The Cook County Assessor's office has put together lists of projected median property tax bills for all suburban towns and city neighborhoods. We've posted them for you to get a look at who's paying more and who's paying less.

Past posts

Clout has a special meaning in Chicago, where it can be a noun, a verb or an adjective. This exercise of political influence in a uniquely Chicago style was chronicled in the Tribune cartoon "Clout Street" in the early 1980s. Clout Street, the blog, offers an inside look at the politics practiced from Chicago's City Hall to the Statehouse in Springfield, through the eyes of the Tribune's political and government reporters.